Broad-daylight broadside collision injures two

Scant official information is available about this wreck, but the damage done to the vehicles speaks clearly of the impact of this smashup …

Parts of vehicles are scattered through this Wilkes Neighborhood intersection in outer East Portland, after a car broadsided a van in the intersection.

Story and photos by David F. Ashton
Sonya Jacobson had just finished “walking the track” at Glendoveer on June 27, and was about to get in her vehicle parked in the northeast lot, at about 1:00 p.m.

“I didn’t see it, but I heard a crash,” Jacobson told East Portland News. “Actually it sounded more like an explosion, except there was scraping and grinding sounds following it.”

Even though the front end of this Subaru Forester was destroyed, witnesses said the driver managed to exit the vehicle – with a little help from bystanders.

When she looked toward the intersection of NE 148th Avenue at NE Halsey Street, she was surprised to see to see a “very large, white van”, visible through a cloud of dust, still rocking on its side. A small flat-bed trailer lay upturned behind it.

In the middle of the intersection, a white Subaru Forester sedan – its front end completely demolished.

With help from others, the driver of this van was able to crawl out through the broken windshield.

“It looked like a man – he had a bloody face – crawled out through the front windshield of the van, and didn’t look too steady on his feet; others were with him,” Jacobson said. “It looked like people helped the driver out of the SUV, I couldn’t tell if it was a man or a woman.”

According to other witnesses at the scene, two ambulances arrived to transport two accident victims to area hospitals; the extent of their injuries, if any, is unknown.

Witnesses tell police officers what they saw when the accident occurred.

While official word about what happened remains unavailable, witnesses agree that the van – a Ford Club Wagon XLT – was driving northbound on NE 148th Avenue, traveling through the intersection with a green traffic signal.

The Subaru Forester, witnesses said, was eastbound on NE Halsey Street, and “blew through the red light”, as one witness put it – hitting the van broadside and pushing it into the northeast curb of the intersection, where it toppled over.

Officers confer while investigating this wreck; the driver in the third vehicle involved – bumper ripped off during the wreck – calls for help.

The force of the collision, witnesses said, caused the van’s utility trailer to fishtail, and soundly smacking into, and ripping most of the front bumper off of, a blue Subaru Tribeca SUV, which came to a stop in the intersection facing westbound.